THE LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN ***
Produced by Robert Nield, Tom Allen, Tiffany Vergon, Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
THE LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN BY HENRY KETCHAM
TO MY TWO OLDER BROTHERS, JOHN LEWIS KETCHAM, AND WILLIAM ALEXANDER KETCHAM, WHO UNDER ABRAHAM LINCOLN AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF LOYALLY SERVED THEIR COUNTRY IN THE WAR FOR THE PERPETUATION OF THE UNION AND THE DESTRUCTION OP SLAVERY, THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED.
CONTENTS.
I. The Wild West II. The Lincoln Family III. Early Years IV. In Indiana V. Second Journey to New Orleans VI. Desultory Employments VII. Entering Politics VIII. Entering the Law IX. On the Circuit X. Social Life and Marriage XI. The Encroachments of Slavery XII. The Awakening of the Lion XIII. Two Things that Lincoln Missed XIV. Birth of the Republican Party XV. The Battle of the Giants XVI. Growing Audacity of the Slave Power XVII. The Backwoodsman at the Center of Eastern Culture XVIII. The Nomination of 1860 XIX. The Election XX. Four Long Months XXI. Journey to Washington XXII. The Inauguration XXIII. Lincoln his Own President XXIV. Fort Sumter XXV. The Outburst of Patriotism XXVI. The War Here to Stay XXVII. The Darkest Hour of the War XXVIII. Lincoln and Fremont XXIX. Lincoln and McClellan XXX. Lincoln and Greeley XXXI. Emancipation XXXII. Discouragements XXXIII. New Hopes XXXIV. Lincoln and Grant XXXV. Literary Characteristics XXXVI. Second Election XXXVII. Close of the War XXXVIII. Assassination XXXIX. A Nation's Sorrow XL. The Measure of a Man XLI. Testimonies
PREFACE.
The question will naturally be raised, Why should there be another Life of Lincoln? This may be met by a counter question, Will there ever be a time in the near future when there will _not_ be another Life of Lincoln? There is always a new class of students and a new enrolment of citizens. Every year many thousands of young people pass from the Grammar to the High School grade of our public schools. Other thousands are growing up into manhood and womanhood. These are of a different constituency from their fathers and grandfathers who remember the civil war and were perhaps in it.
"To the younger generation," writes Carl Schurz, "Abraham Lincoln has already become a half mythical figure, which, in the haze of historic distance, grows to more and more heroic proportions, but also loses in distinctness of outline and figure." The last clause of this remark is painfully true. To the majority of people now living, his outline and figure are dim and vague. There are to-day professors and presidents of colleges, legislators of prominence, lawyers and judges, literary men, and successful business men, to whom Lincoln is a tradition. It cannot be expected that a person born after the year (say) 1855, could remember Lincoln more than as a name. Such an one's ideas are made up not from his remembrance and appreciation of events as they occurred, but from what he has read and heard about them in subsequent years.
The great mine of information concerning the facts of Lincoln's life is, and probably will always be, the History by his secretaries, Nicolay and Hay. This is worthily supplemented by the splendid volumes of Miss Tarbell. There are other biographies of great value. Special mention should be made of the essay by Carl Schurz, which is classic.
The author has consulted freely all the books on the subject he could lay his hands on. In this volume there is no attempt to write a history of the times in which Lincoln lived and worked. Such historical events as have been narrated were selected solely because they illustrated some phase of the character of Lincoln. In this biography the single purpose has been to present the living man with such distinctness of outline that the reader may have a sort of feeling of being acquainted with him. If the reader, finishing this volume, has a vivid realization of Lincoln as a man, the author will be fully repaid.
